Chapter 65. Holly
Holly
There was no time to think or process the shock. Shock? No, it’s more than that. You’re a writer, Hol. Find a better word: stupefied? astounded? She paused for a moment, but nothing seemed big enough—nothing fit the enormity of the moment.
Anna.
Holly got her hands under her sister’s arms and pulled with all her might. It wasn’t nearly as taxing as she thought it would be to drag her out of the room. She used her foot to close the door on the noxious fumes still filling the wine cellar.
Thankfully, Ethan reappeared, his arrival perfectly timed. There was no way for Holly to carry Anna up and out, and she didn’t have the strength or the voice to tell Ethan who he was slinging over his shoulder.
“Jade is alive,” he called out while rushing up the stairs. “I don’t know how bad off she is, but I sent a cop to find Dr. Hill and we’ve called for an ambulance.”
Holly kept pace behind him, still reeling. Was it all in her mind, a hallucination like the one she’d had with the woman on the boardwalk?
It wasn’t long before they reached the safety of fresh air. There Holly found Jade, sprawled out on the lawn, moving slightly, which was a wonderful sign.
“Stay still, Jade,” Ethan instructed. “Your body needs to conserve oxygen right now.”
A small crowd of partygoers dressed in their beachy attire had gathered around, gawking but offering no real help.
Ethan gently laid Anna on the grass beside Jade.
Holly approached cautiously, unsure and unsteady, half expecting the fresh air to have shattered the illusion.
When Ethan stepped aside, Holly had a clearer view of the face looking up at the night sky.
There was no doubt who this was—Anna’s face was forever imprinted on Holly’s mind. Time couldn’t erase it.
For Holly, writing was painting with words. The page was her canvas, her prose her brushstrokes. The end result was a story that made sense. But right now nothing was making sense. Holly felt trapped inside a dream.
Kneeling beside her sister, Holly grasped Anna’s hand, which felt cool to the touch. She was still unconscious and couldn’t speak. Blood seeped from the cut on her shoulder.
Dr. Hill hurried across the lawn. He carried a first-aid kit, which would be useful for treating Anna’s wound, but what she and Jade needed most was supplemental oxygen.
With Ethan tending to Jade—he was a volunteer firefighter, after all—Dr. Hill triaged Anna.
Holly stepped aside to let them work. She became an observer like the others.
A profound helplessness overwhelmed her.
The two people who mattered to her most might be on the precipice of death, and she could do nothing more.
Eventually a pair of ambulances arrived. A team of medics administered oxygen to Jade while splinting her broken wrist, cleaning her cuts, and checking her vitals.
With Jade in the hands of professionals, Ethan moved to Anna’s side and checked her pulse.
The past replayed before Holly’s eyes. But this time, there was no gurney, no sheet, no death.
Today there was life, even though Anna had lost a significant amount of blood.
Still, her pulse was strong, Ethan reported.
Her heart rate was approaching normal, and her lungs were clearing out the toxic air she and Jade had been breathing.
When Anna was stable enough, Holly returned to her sister’s side.
She stroked her cheek. It was warm to the touch.
It was strange to see time pass so quickly—as Anna went from twenty-four to her forties, like turning a page in a book.
She was as Holly remembered, except she had dyed her wavy, gorgeous auburn hair a less lustrous brown.
Her heart-shaped face was fuller with age, and her hazel eyes retained the same color and depth Holly remembered.
“I don’t understand how you’re here. I have so many questions,” Holly stammered. The tears finally flowed, racing down her cheeks like rivers heading to the sea. Her chest was heavy with sadness, relief, and profound confusion, leaving Holly breathless.
“I know you do,” Anna whispered, her words choking out through her tears. She gave Holly’s hand a weak squeeze. “Jade … is she—?”
“She’s alive. She’s going to be fine,” Holly said. “Ethan got her out just in time.”
She used his name as if Anna would know him, as if she’d remember Holly in his arms, sobbing while her sister was wheeled away. But no, it couldn’t have been Anna. There had been a dead body under that sheet, hadn’t there?
If it hadn’t been Anna, then who had died that night?
“How?” Holly asked, her voice trembling, her whole body shaking as the initial shock began to fade. “Where have you been? How is this possible? How are you alive? And why were you in the cellar with Jade?”
Anna smiled faintly, light dancing briefly in her eyes as Holly’s questions lingered in the air. Anna’s smile widened as she held Holly’s hand, their fingers entwined.
“I needed to keep you safe. I knew where to find her, and you,” Anna said softly, her voice gentle as the night breeze blowing through their hair. “Because I’ve been watching. I’ve always been watching.”